An Afterthought
by Sepulchral-Roses
Summary: The power of the world, its fate, its future, its weight. Resting on innocence's shoulders. My admiration for our leaders is past description, but I try to catalog it in a simple, yet cryptic passage. Simply read, and enjoy, and think about those truths.


In honor of the one thing…the one show that could keep something alive through the year, I write this now. Avatar the Last Airbender, the one thing that tied people around the world together and united them in an epic battle of wits, love, and wisdom. For so long, we waited for this day; this finale, and now, we wonder what to do with ourselves. I say, we continue its legacy and keep it alive until we have…another Avatar.

Let the battles, let the challenge…_begin_.

* * *

For so long, I have watched these leaders grow up, and I watched them conquer the wisdom none of us ever dared to seek, the life within no one thought to know. I watched them hurt, I watched them fall, but I also watched them love, and choose right.

For that is what the world is. A choice. A choice between right and wrong, and a unified home. Everything is indeed, one. No one shall ever forget what these children have done for the world, for us. They were selfless and patient, and they showed even the best of us, that the power of the future truly lies in the hands of the wise. And the children showed themselves to be those of the wisest ever seen.

A hundred years past from a single mistake finds a world indeed becoming reborn from the dark ashes of consequence. The Avatar and the Firelord – friends and visionaries. A twelve year old held the world and its fate in one palm, and he chose the choice invisible. He chose to forgive.

A seventeen year old too, held a large fate in his hands. He held the fate of leading the dying breed of hope through the embers and flames through to the sun on the other side. He, with the help of closest friends, pulled us through gently. Patience, is a virtue.

I myself did little, though in their eyes, I'm a hero. But it was their hardest work and effort that drove them and it was their pain and power that pulled through. Cryptic pointers, tea, and a finger in the seemingly right direction seem little compared to these feats.

Respect comes to those who show the world fairness. The new Firelord, if he were to ever make the mistake of his great-grandfather before him, would be followed blindly for his path. Yet, though he has the power to, he shall never choose wealth and luxury over what is right. What is right is hard to come by and cannot be missed, as small a road as it may be.

Innocence does not always come with a price, and there is always a better way than violence. The Avatar fought the greatest battle of his life, on the verge and teetering point of heartbreak, fear, and despair. Yet he, with a little hope and great wisdom, stopped and found something no one can share with him. He found the source of power within himself, one that was and is, utterly true and pure.

Friendships kindled through the bridge of flames and hurt, love sparked in between great chasms of darkness and mistrust, and those tiny pinpricks of light acted as the stars of a new moon's guiding force.

I have witnessed the terrible deaths of many thousands. I witnessed the death of a Spirit, the death of countless unknown soldiers, all who had families and loved ones who felt the anvil of their loss crushing their hearts.

But I know that when the battle for power becomes something more, innocence and truth will _always_ win. No matter the final results, hope shall never be truly gone from our souls.

Hope for a better tomorrow, for the coming end to a struggle, for a way to conquer and forget the losses. Like a turtle, new into the world, always returns to the sea, the hope will be our sea. Our sea of wishes and something worth fighting for.

I have learned from my nephew, Zuko, more than he could ever know. I have learned from the Avatar, small and young as he is that wisdom comes in every heart. From their wives, their cousins, their children, their siblings, their grandchildren, I have learned that hope is also found in a small thing. A smile, and the admiration of the choices gone right in our favor.

I, simply "Uncle Iroh" to those I meet and grow to know, promise to uphold the new traditions for as long as I see the sun rise everyday, and as long as tea gives me joy.

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**You don't have to review if you don't want to. This time, I'm glad for those who read this and took it in. I hope that it spoke to you about things further than just A:TLA, and that you liked it, of course.**

Dedicated to: Mike and Bryan, Nickelodeon, Viacom, Mako, and to every fan who finds a new blow to themselves now that the show is over.

For: Sweetnessnarose, Smilypie. (The rest of Avatar is fandom now, and it's part in your hands. Hopefully in the while I'm gone, I'll be bombarded with owls on your latest chapters! Show Fanfiction and AVATAR what you can do.)

_**--iamtheblindbandit--l--sepulchral roses--**_


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